Threat: Follow up to Stranded but not Alone (Dragoslava Connection) by Cora Blu Read Free Book Online Page B

was frightened, and he watched the fight weaken in her slumped shoulders. Bethany chewed the corner of her mouth, tilting her head to one side, eyes closed. What had he missed?
    Eyes open, Bethany rocked on her heels looking terrified. “I’m scared, Khail. Is that what you want to hear? That I’m scared and the only person I can think to turn to is you.”
    There is was. “I’m right here, baby.”
    Bethany shifted on her boots scuffing them in the snow. “How do I trust, when I’m broken? I’m on edge and scared and my family is in Arizona. I need them right now.”
    Hold her, just hold her. “Stay with me…Let me keep you safe.”
    “I know in my heart you believe in me, but I don’t trust you. It’s not about us getting along anymore, Khail. It’s about trust, and I don’t trust you.”
    He could see that. “I’m not going to sit by while somebody threatens your life.”
    “I’m not stopping you from finding them. Figuring out who’s doing this and working out how I feel about you after everything that’s happened between us is causing a tornado of emotions. You think I can just put everything in separate envelopes and deal with them individually. Well I can’t.”
    This way wasn’t working for him.
    “What do I do when staying away from you starts to eat away at my heart every day that you walk past my office?”
    “I didn’t bring this on us.”
    “What do I do when I can’t stop thinking of you when I wake up in the morning?”
    “Don’t do that to me, Khail.” Her soft voice trembled as she took a step back in the snow crunching under her boots and waving a hand at his chest. But he wasn’t stopping.
    “What happens when I want to hold you again? You think I can just walk away because you’re pissed?”
    “Don’t charm me, Khail. Looking at me like that isn’t going to erase the pain.”
    He’d had enough. Closing his arms around her shoulders, he brought her to his chest hugging her tight to his body, their jackets a barrier he loathed. She kept her arms folded against his chest.
    At the office every day, seeing Bethany coming and going to lunch, running out to her truck, talking to Glenda standing in the hall, it was pure hell not to touch her.
    “Nobody can see us here behind the truck. I don’t want to push you or force you to forgive me. But you don’t get to tell me I don’t care about you. You’ve been hell to work around lately.”
    “You created this hell you’re working in, don’t put that on me.”
    “Then stop fighting me so I can fix it. We’re not done with this.” They had hours and hours of talk ahead of them, and she was going to listen if he had to kidnap her himself.
    “I don’t know how to trust you anymore on a personal level.”
    He gave her an odd stare. “You don’t think I’m worth a second chance.”
    She sighed deep in her chest, slowly unfolding her arms to wipe at the tear escaping her eyes, leaving a trail of pain down her face. “Not yet,” she admitted.
    “Then I’ll wait.”
    “I have some research to do for a client, Mrs. Rykerman. You know Mikhail, when Mrs. Rykerman speaks about her husband it’s obvious she’d give back all the millions he left her to have him back for one more day.” She touched the space between her breasts patting gently. “That’s what I want. A love I’d wish back from the dead, not wish he were dead when I think of our past.”
    “You wish I were dead, Bethany?”
    “Not even if I had the power,” she admitted and he felt the honesty and it tightened is gut. “I do wish that when you thought about me, it had been enough to keep you from calling Gemme. That’s what I wish. I wish I could accept your apology, but you can’t apologize for something you did on purpose knowing it would hurt me.”
    He wasn’t ready to tell her the truth…no he wasn’t ready to face his demons.
    He came close tugging his sweater poking out under her ski jacket. She’d grabbed it from his luggage in the office